Radio New Zealand

Mrs Parker

In the winter of 1954 two schoolgirls—Pauline Parker and Juliet Hulme—murdered Pauline’s mother on a remote walking track in Christchurch, New Zealand.

Nearly sixty years later the case still fascinates many. There’s a seemingly never ending supply of articles, films and books all speculating on the motives and relationship between the two murderers. Were they 'girls gone mad', or 'girls gone bad?'

Documentary-maker Ruth Beran travelled back to the crime scene with author Peter Graham, to discover what echoes of this case remain in the buildings, landscape, and people of Christchurch; and what this might reveal about current societal attitudes towards women, lesbianism, crime and punishment.